[ExI] Capitalistic Corruption

[spike at rainier66.com]

...> On Behalf Of Gadersd via extropy-chat
Subject: Re: [ExI] Capitalistic Corruption

>>... On the contrary.  You can still post without Twitter blue and people will still see it if they follow you.

>...What if one doesn’t have any followers? Then no one finds your posts and so you don’t obtain any new followers...

Oh OK I see where you are going.  I never worried about who could see my posts.  I am using Twitter as my new news source, the place which really is fair and balanced (in a sense.)  I don't care if others cannot see my comments, for I have never tweeted anything and probably won't.

There was a discussion going on about 1998 or so in this forum about something related to what you are saying.  We had a forum here with the usual suspects, the tech geek crowd.  In a remarkable example of foresight, then-teenage Eliezer was pointing out that we must all be very careful about what we post online because the internet never forgets.  If you post something that later becomes politically or socially damaging, that can hang around your neck forever.

I was a poster-child example of someone who never gave a hoot about my online reputation.  I claimed jester's privilege early and often (still do.)  I was good to people, but I did ridicule some things, butchered more than my share of sacred cows and dined sumptuously upon their barbecued flesh.  But I went further.

Back in the 90s when I had more time for that kind of thing, ExiChat people would often come into town.  It's a big advantage of living in a tech mecca: interesting people come to you, no need to travel.  You can invite them to stay at your home, even less need to travel.

During that discussion, I offered a means of plausible deniability for one's internet past: have friends who know you well attempt to mimic you using your email account.  This I did with a number of occasional house guest, with mixed results.  I never did really get one who sounded me-ey to me.  The game was to get them to write in my style and see if they could fool the ExI-chat group into thinking I wrote that.  We had a blast.  Well, I did at least.

What that blue check is for is to get some kind of traceability to a particular poster.  Without it, there is no enforceable accountability to the poster, because it would allow spoofing.  If for instance a Twitter user in Iran reveals that they is homosexual, the blue check informs the local constabulary who they will hang.  But without the blue check, even Iran will not hang whoever's name is on that account because the authorities can't be sure they is the right person.

In retrospect, that paragraph above is a very poor defense of the blue check system.

Conclusion Daniel: for becoming an influencer, Twitter isn't the right place.  Face Book is still there I understand.  It is government controlled, but it is free.

Hey, that puts a whole nuther spin on it: government controlled but free.  Twitter is broken the surly bonds of government control, but at a price.  Free speech isn't free.

spike